


Symbiotic

by manic_intent



Category: Wolverine (Movies), X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Promptfic, That AU fic where Logan meets the Xaviers much earlier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-01
Updated: 2016-05-01
Packaged: 2018-06-05 18:04:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6715576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manic_intent/pseuds/manic_intent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Raven,” Charles said quietly as Raven set herself in front of Charles, fists clenched. Someone unpeeled himself from the shadows behind the next truck in a rolling swagger. The dim light from the neon signs did his harshly angular face no favours, painting his darkly whiskery face in sharp shadows. He wasn’t that tall, but somehow, the stranger still gave off an impression of sheer <i>mass</i> under his red flannel shirt and the frayed gray jeans that rode low on tapering hips. And his mind - his <i>mind</i> was blistered by fragments. </p><p>“Couple of runners?” the stranger drawled, in a husky accent. “Run a long way, I’m guessing. All the way from Westchester county?” </p><p>Raven crouched, but Charles grabbed at her shoulder and pressed his fingers to his temple, reaching for the stranger’s mind, trying to put him to sleep, to <i>erase</i>, but the stranger only shook his head, like shooing away a fly. “You the reader then, boy? That tickles.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Symbiotic

**Author's Note:**

> Mandarin translation: http://www.mtslash.org/thread-225336-1-1.html
> 
> Prompt: Charles/Logan, Motorcycle(s), for Cirnelle  
> 200th fic AO3 fic! :O Wow. I am so long winded.  
> A big thank you to all readers out there. :) 
> 
> I think I’ve already written Charles/Logan and motorcycles at least once (in Let Them Talk)… here’s another AU, where Logan meets bb!teen Xaviers when they are much younger.

I.

_Are they gone?_ Raven asked, in the silence of their minds. Charles closed his eyes, reaching out. No one for a mile since the highway. He nodded.

“There’s a rest stop for truckers a mile up,” Charles said, shaky with exhaustion, even as Raven’s skin flickered, scales flipping back to her normal blue form. “We can get something to eat there.” 

“You packed cash?”

“We don’t need cash.” Charles tapped his fingers against the side of his head. 

Raven pulled a face. “Oh please, you’re not _that_ good.” 

“Got to try. We have to eat.” Hunger was a hollow pit, weighing down on his gut. “C’mon. First we eat. Then-“

“Then what?” Raven followed him though, even as Charles shifted the hastily packed duffel bag over his shoulder. “Call your mom? Your stepdad? I bet they’re the ones who called in those government baggers. Who else would’ve known about us? You’re _home schooled_.” 

“I would’ve known,” Charles said uncertainly. 

“How? You don’t read their minds that much.” 

Charles tripped against a root, and Raven caught him, steadying him. His sneakers were thickly muddy, as were her feet. They’d abandoned Charles’ mother’s car offroad under the highway when the fuel had gone to the red and the engine had started coughing alarmingly, but now Charles was starting to regret it. A little further and they could’ve made it to the rest stop to refuel. Maybe. 

“How would they have known about us? You’ve never shown them your blue form. And other than that little trip to the psych ward when I was eight, they don’t know about what I can do.”

“Oh, I think they do,” Raven said grimly. “You don’t read their minds because your mother’s afraid all the time and your stepdad’s no better. ‘Toxic’, you said. Should’ve dug deeper. Think you would’ve been surprised. Trust me. I could see it. Besides, one more year and you’d have been eighteen. Your father’s trust fund money would’ve come completely under your control. Bet they’ve been looking for a way to get rid of you for a while.” 

“I don’t believe it,” Charles said stubbornly, and when Raven opened her mouth to disagree, he sighed. “We’re hungry and cold. Let’s just get somewhere warm and with food and we’ll talk this over, all right?”

They trudged on in miserable silence. Footsore and exhausted, Charles was shaky on his feet by the time they got to the rest stop, so tired that Raven frowned at him and said, “Look. If you try and do your trick in there like you are, we’ll be caught out for sure.” 

“We’ve been on the run all day. Haven’t eaten anything since breakfast.” They were so _close_. Where they were, tucked behind an empty truck at the very corner of the parking lot, Charles could still see the neon lights from the diner. He could almost smell the oil.

“I guess we can eat dinner in juvenile detention,” Raven flickered into an older version of her ‘blonde bombshell’ look, her jaw set. Her determination fed through on the surface of her mind, and Charles blinked. 

“Raven, you _can’t_.”

“This is a truck stop. There’s walkers like me everywhere. Most of them runaways.” 

“I’d rather go hungry.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Raven began, then she abruptly whirled around as someone started to clap. 

“Raven,” Charles said quietly as Raven set herself in front of Charles, fists clenched. Someone unpeeled himself from the shadows behind the next truck in a rolling swagger. The dim light from the neon signs did his harshly angular face no favours, painting his darkly whiskery face in sharp shadows. He wasn’t that tall, but somehow, the stranger still gave off an impression of sheer _mass_ under his red flannel shirt and the frayed gray jeans that rode low on tapering hips. And his mind - his _mind_ was blistered by fragments. 

“Couple of runners?” the stranger drawled, in a husky accent. “Run a long way, I’m guessing. All the way from Westchester county?” 

Raven crouched, but Charles grabbed at her shoulder and pressed his fingers to his temple, reaching for the stranger’s mind, trying to put him to sleep, to _erase_ , but the stranger only shook his head, like shooing away a fly. “You the reader then, boy? That tickles.” 

“You’re one of them.” Raven growled. 

“Was. _Was_ one of them.” Flannel Shirt indicated his clothes with a meaty finger. “Don’t see the uniform now, d’you?”

“What, you think we’re stupid?” Raven demanded, incredulous. “We run away from some ‘black ops’ agents who raid our house, looking for us, run all the way here and _whoops_ , here’s some ‘ex-black ops’ guy from the same team, ready to make friends. Please. Give us some credit.” 

Flannel Shirt scratched absently at his jaw. “I’m not here for you, kid. Or your brother. Say, those people who raided your house, you get a good look at them?”

“Hard _not_ to,” Charles pointed out warily. 

“D’you kids see someone about this high, likes to run on all fours, dark haired, lots of claws?” 

Charles opened his mouth, but Raven elbowed him heavily before he could speak. “What’s it to you?”

“Unfinished business. Ain’t none of _your_ business. Be thankful.”

Raven held out her palm. “Twenty bucks.” 

“ _Raven_ ,” Charles said, shocked. 

“Nothing’s free. Or, we could whoop your ass and take your wallet.” 

“Like to see you try,” Flannel Shirt said, amused, but he palmed his wallet from his back pocket and pulled out a couple of tenners. “So?” 

Raven clenched and unclenched her fist pointedly, and Flannel Shirt gave her the money in a flourish. “Okay. Yeah. There was some crazy feral cat guy, came right in through the window, tore up the carpet trying to pounce on us. We shut a door in his face to slow him down, and then I whacked him hard with a golf club.” 

Flannel Shirt snorted. “That’s it? That wouldn’t have slowed him none. You telling me the truth?”

“I made him think that his friends were us,” Charles muttered. “In the mess, we uh, stole my mum’s car.” 

Flannel Shirt whistled. “Your ability’s got to be off the _charts_ if you could do that. Means they’re not gonna give up on you.” He scratched his jaw again, thoughtfully. “S’pose if I stick close to you kids, eventually Victor’s gonna come to me.” 

“No way in hell. Like I said. You think we’re dumb?” Raven demanded resentfully. 

Flannel Shirt shrugged. “Do what you like. Keep on running. But I used to run with the pack,” he said, with a smile that was all teeth. “And we always caught up with the rabbit sooner or later.” 

“Raven, it’s okay,” Charles said wearily. Skimming Flannel Shirt’s mind was tough, but he was getting the hang of the surface flow. “Logan here can be trusted.” 

“You _are_ good,” Logan smirked. “Never had a ‘reader get so much as a peep outta me before.”

“He’s also going to pay for our dinner,” Charles added evenly. “Because if it’s revenge that you’re looking for, I had a good look inside Wraith’s mind. He knows where the base is.” 

“You’re good, but you ain’t that good,” Logan shook his head slowly. “I’m not looking for revenge, bub. I just wanna get my idiot brother out of a bad situation.” He glanced at Raven. “Think you can relate.” 

She glared at him, but eventually Raven sniffed, and straightened up imperiously. “Fine. He can pay for dinner.”

II.

Logan owned one of the beat up old trucks, or at least, he said that he did. Charles and Raven weren’t so sure. There was a pair of fluffy dice hung over the rearview mirror, as well as a little dancing Hawaiian girl doll on the dash. But most tellingly, there was a disturbing, dark stain on the seats, and three precise puncture marks around chest-height on the driver’s seat.

“Get in,” Logan said gruffly, hauling himself up onto the driver’s side, then he frowned at them. “What now?”

Raven gripped Charles’ wrist. “Maybe we should split up after all.” 

Logan stared at them, then glanced down at the truck seats and snorted. “This? It’s a week old.” 

“You’re still not inspiring confidence here,” Raven told him. 

“Pssh. I didn’t kill the guy. Might’ve just hurt him a little. I kinda took offence to him trying’na run me down with this truck.” 

This explanation didn’t reassure Raven in the least, for obvious reasons, but Charles sighed and started to climb into the cab of the truck. _Charles_ , Raven projected loudly. 

_We’re tired, we don’t have a way out of here without walking, and I still think we can trust him,_ Charles replied, without looking back. 

_We’re going to get murdered and dumped in the river,_ Raven shot back, though she grudgingly climbed in, and they curled up against together on the wide seat, squished in, as Logan grunted and started up the engine. 

“What’s in the back?” Raven jerked her thumb towards the closed hatch in the back of the cab. 

“My things.” Charles could hear Logan thinking about whether or not to say anything else, and he felt a fleeting impression of suspicion that fed to a sensation of wry resignation. “Some clothes. My bike.” 

“Why aren’t you riding the bike, then?” Raven asked suspiciously. 

“She got banged up when this here truck hit us, so she needs some tooling. I got a place up north.”

“Why did the truck hit you again?” Raven inquired, blinking, even as Charles asked, “How north?” 

“You kids normally talk so much?” Logan sighed. “Truck hit me ‘cos some folks took exception to a mutie making some hard cash out of a cage fight. And it’d be a six hour trip or so, give or take. You guys can sack out.” 

“Six _hours_?” Raven goggled.

Charles did the math. “Canada?” he hazarded. 

“That’s it in one.” 

_CANADA!?_ Raven was so loud in Charles’ head that he winced. 

_Still our best shot. We don’t have anywhere else to go_. Charles projected reassurance and calm until Raven subsided, if sullenly, and they pressed their foreheads together, aligning thoughts, sharing impressions, calculating strategy, all within seconds. Then Raven exhaled. 

_Your call._

_Just one more thing._ Charles assured her. “Logan, if you’re looking to help your brother, why bother taking us all the way to Canada?” 

“‘Cos I know the ground up there, bub. And fact is, I might be sticking with you kids for convenience, but I’d kinda rather the two of you survived your next meet-cute with the pack. ‘Sides, I wanna fix my bike.”

 _Okay_ , Raven said grudgingly. _For now._

 _For now_ , Charles agreed. They curled awkwardly in the chair, Raven pressed against the door, Charles squashed against her, and they slept uneasily, rocked by the open road.

III.

They stopped over in a B&B in Montreal for breakfast and to ‘kit up’, as Logan called it. The thrift shop’s owner was a floridly cheerful, blue-eyed grandmother of two, gray-haired, God-fearing, second-generation Canadian, and she alternated between gentleness and suspicion. _What’s up with her?_ Raven asked, as she tried on a blue parka.

 _Marie thinks there’s no way in hell Logan over there is our uncle. Thinks he kidnapped us._ Charles wasn’t sure whether to be amused. He’d already picked out a parka, underwear and socks. They hadn’t packed cold weather clothes. _She’s thinking about taking you aside in the changing room and asking you if we need help._

 _Could be a way out._ Raven didn’t feel convinced. 

_And then where would we be? She’ll give us to child services. We’ll be separated. Worse, I’m sure that black ops team’s probably logged in to every government database out there._ Charles glanced over at Logan, who was smoking outside the store on the kerb, rolling his foul smelling cigar in his hands. 

_Okay. We stick to the plan. He’s just our suspiciously dangerous-looking uncle._ Raven frowned at the pairs of jeans in her hands. _This is going to be weird._

_What?_

_Wearing clothes._ She grinned. 

_Going to be cold up there,_ Charles pointed out doubtfully. _Really cold. You could handle winter in our warmed up Westchester house just in your skin but it’s better to be safe. Besides, it’d be weird if I’m the only kid buying clothes._

 _Heard you the first time._ Raven disappeared off to the change room, followed by Marie, and Charles ducked outside, where Logan eyed him with a slight frown. 

“Kids done bankrupting me yet?”

“Almost.” Charles was shivering out of the warmth of the store, his hands shoved into his pockets. “Just to let you know, Marie the storekeeper thinks you kidnapped us.”

“Yeah, could see how she got that impression.” Logan sounded amused. 

“She’s thinking about calling the police.” 

Logan breathed out a plume of smoke. “Could be a problem.” He didn’t sound impressed, though he stiffened as Charles took in a deep breath and shuffled over, curling an arm around Logan’s back. He’d come late into his growth spurt at seventeen, but he was already nearly as tall as Logan. Up so close, Logan didn’t seem so threatening. 

“Kid?” Logan rumbled, though he didn’t move as Charles pressed his cheek to Logan’s shoulder. Logan smelled like a big animal, warm and pleasant, under the gritty cigar smoke.

“I’m seventeen,” Charles said mulishly. “ _Not_ a kid.” 

“Matter of perspective,” Logan chuckled. “I’m way older than ya.” He rested a big palm lightly over Charles’ hip, blowing out another plume of acrid smoke. “Nowhere as pretty, but there you go.” 

Charles wished that he wasn’t blushing. _Pretty_? No one had ever said anything of the sort to him before. “You can’t be older than thirty. Maybe thirty-five.” 

“I’ve been kicking around.” Charles skimmed a flash of images, a war somewhere, muddy and desperate, living rough in a dark forest before even that. 

“You were in a war?”

“Been in a few.” 

Charles frowned. “Hasn’t there just been only one recently? Or do you mean as part of the black ops team?” 

“Don’t ask so many questions.” Logan patted his back. “And stay out of my mind, kid.” 

“My name is _Charles_.” They’d grudgingly introduced themselves to Logan over dinner, but Logan had seemed indifferent. 

“Sure thing, Chuck.”

“ _Charles_ ,” Charles repeated, a little nettled, but Logan merely snorted, going back to watching the street.

 _Hey,_ he heard Raven projecting. _Maybe Logan should come in and pay up._

Marie seemed more relaxed as Logan handed over a greasy wad of cash for their new clothes, and she smiled reassuringly at Charles. _Looks like it worked,_ Raven told him. _She thinks you’re related now?_

 _Not really. Her son is gay._

_Oh. Oh!_ Raven stifled a giggle, her mind all warm amusement. _Well,_ she teased, _Logan is kinda hot if you don’t mind the wild man look._

 _RAVEN,_ Charles was shocked. She rolled her eyes at him as they pulled on parkas and carried out their shopping, though Marie tugged at Logan’s shoulder within the shop before he could follow them, murmuring. He nodded gravely at her, then ambled out, glancing oddly at Charles before heading towards their truck. 

“Got to buy supplies, then it’s gonna be a couple hours more up north.” Logan told them. “Either of you can cook?”

“Nope.” Raven offered. “Charles can’t even boil water.”

“Shit. Kids now’days.”

IV.

Logan’s ‘place up north’ was really a log cabin, one that looked straight out of a horror movie, perched deep in dense woods up a narrow path. They’d abandoned the truck a while ago in the parking lot of a trucker rest stop and walked the rest of the way, Logan wheeling his damaged bike. It was a road hog, one of the chrome handlebars badly bent, and it was heavily scratched, but other than that it wasn’t as badly damaged as Charles had imagined.

The gruelling walk up the mountain had been helped along by ample bars of chocolate, and Charles wasn’t sure whether he was exhausted or buzzed by the time they’d actually gotten there. There was no electricity. Logan seemed oblivious to their mute horror as he started a fire in the hearth and packed away the groceries in the pantry. 

“What?” he asked finally, when he noticed. 

“You _live_ here?” Raven demanded.

“Yeah? It’ll warm up.” 

“Does this place even have a _bathroom_?” Charles blinked.

“Oh, I see.” Logan smirked. “Well fuck me sideways, princess. I thought we were on the run. Can’t book us all into a hotel.” 

“I thought we were going to your _house_ ,” Raven blinked. “I kinda imagined. A house. Like. One with _lights_.” 

“Look, kid. There’s a generator out back but it’s probably iced over. You want lights, you and your cute little brother can go out back and get it started up. Try not to break it. As to the bathroom, just head out into the woods and-“ Logan started to chuckle at the look on their faces. “Kidding. There’s running water, all right? Got this fixed up years ago.”

“We’re going to die,” Raven told Charles later, as they prodded dubiously at the generator. 

“Don’t be so fatalistic.” Charles was fascinated. He’d lived so long in sheer privilege that the last couple of days had been an utter culture shock. “This is amazing. I didn’t know that there were people who lived like this. Do you think there’s even hot water?” 

“Oh _God_ ,” Raven groaned. “I spent a month on the streets before I met you, but the _shelters_ had hot water, and it wasn’t this cold.” 

Perhaps to Raven’s disappointment(?), they didn’t die by dinner, which was a surprisingly good pasta. By boiling up water, they’d even managed to have a shower in the tiny but functional bathroom, and by the time Charles and Raven had curled up under blankets and furs in the spare bedroom to sleep, Charles was feeling a lot better about the whole situation. 

“We’re still here as bait,” Raven whispered to him, as they lay against each other in the dark. “And if we get lost in that forest out there, it won’t end well.”

“I know.” Charles hugged her close. “We just need to stick together. It’s going to be all right.”

“Charles,” Raven prodded him in the ribs, “It’s _not_. I bet your stepdad’s already declared you dead. You’ve got nothing in the world to your name but your clothes, and we owe Logan for half of them. Don’t you get it? _Nothing’s_ going to be all right.”

“We’re alive,” Charles disagreed. “That’s good enough for me.”

V.

Life settled in as the days grew slowly warmer. Logan had a clear daily routine that didn’t involve guests: he woke up early, did a quiet loop around the house in the snow, then brought in firewood. Whatever mutation he had, it seemed to make him impervious to the cold: some days he went out in a parka, some days he didn’t seem to bother. After breakfast, usually leftovers from dinner or whatever else was in the pantry, Logan would work on his bike or disappear into the woods. If it was the latter, he usually returned eventually in the night with supplies, indifferent to dinner. If it was the former, he cooked.

Raven, shell-shocked by ‘living rough in the fucking wilderness’, as she put it, was numb to the routine at the start, then energised. She found a map in the cabin and figured out where they were, then spent a couple of days memorising it. She forced Charles to accompany her on ‘walks’, hikes that grew longer and more gruelling by the week, and when he complained, ignored him. They learned how to make their way to the rest stop, with a compass at first, and then blind, with just Charles reaching ahead with his ability, feeling for minds. And after that, Raven often popped off on her ‘walks’ by herself.

“She’s being paranoid,” Charles complained to Logan, one one of the afternoons that Logan was working on his bike. The handlebars had been fixed, but the paintwork was beyond help without a professional. Still, as Logan revved up the bike experimentally, it let out a low, coughing rumble, like the purr of some great animal. 

Logan grunted. “She’s smart. You, not so much.” 

Charles plopped himself down on a crate. “It’s been weeks. Maybe they’ve given up.”

“After that stunt you pulled with Victor? They ain’t giving up. And my brother’s good at making things personal. ‘Sides, the walks have been doing you some good. You ain’t just some soft, pretty kid no more.”

“Reduced to being just a ‘pretty kid’, then,” Charles drawled. Logan laughed, all low, harsh barks as he shut down the ignition.

“That you are, kid.” There was a quick flash of images in the top level of Logan’s mind, lurid and knife-sharp, charged gritty by avarice. No. Not just avarice. _Lust_. When Charles blinked, Logan frowned, and straightened up from his bike, wiping down his greasy palms on a rag. “What have I told you about staying out of my mind?” 

“Normally,” Charles said slowly, “That’s when people start getting angry or frightened.” 

“I’ve seen worse things than some kid whose party trick is to pick out what I’m thinking about them.” Logan sauntered closer, crowding over until Charles found his back to the wall, bracketed in, Logan’s palm pressed pointedly on the log beside his head. “I don’t like to repeat myself, bub.” 

“I know.” Charles knew he should be apologising, or at least beginning to feel threatened, but he felt light-headed instead, breathing deep. There was still that warm animal smell to Logan, that dangerous, quiet confidence. Logan wasn’t angry. He was, if anything, merely curious. Waiting. “I think you should kiss me now,” Charles managed to whisper. 

“Yeah?” Logan’s mouth quirked up at one corner. 

“You want to.”

“Done it before?” 

Charles swallowed, and looked up at Logan through his lashes. “No. Is that a problem?”

“Aw fuck,” Logan sighed. “I’m a dirty old man.” Then he bent, and the first press of his mouth on Charles’ was tentative, like he was waiting for Charles to pull back, then he pressed Charles into the wall, big hands curling down to Charles’ hips, then his ass, when Charles merely whined and rubbed against one thickly muscular thigh. It was gentler and sweeter than Charles had expected, ashy on his tongue.

“You should stop smoking,” Charles suggested, when Logan let up for air. 

“Pushy,” Logan told him, though when he bent to kiss Charles again, Charles leaned up the rest of the way.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter: manic_intent  
> tumblr: manic-intent


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